Trump’s Not Kinky, He’s Just An Asshole

This isn’t some “your kink is OK” thing. This was an act of racism and toxic masculinity, of marking territory, of demanding ownership and feeling entitled.

When I first saw that #watersportsgate was trending on Twitter and it had to do with Donald Trump, I dismissed it pretty quickly. I’ve been kinky my entire adult life, and frankly, stories about adults engaging in pervy sex are often sensationalist and dependent on making moralistic judgments about how others like to have sex. Boring, am I right?

But then I read the memo over on Buzzfeed, and I realized that all the journalists and commentators acting shocked about Trump flagging yellow hankies had missed something glaringly obvious while clutching their — dare I say it — pearl necklaces.

“According to Source D, where s/he had been present, TRUMP’s (perverted) conduct in Moscow included hiring the presidential suite of the Ritz Carlton Hotel, where he knew President and Mrs. OBAMA (whom he hated) had stayed on one of their official trips to Russia, and defiling the bed where they had slept by employing a number of prostitutes to perform a ‘golden showers’ (urination) show in front of him.”

This is an act of power, control and a desire to humiliate others — not terribly surprising coming from Trump, someone who has repeatedly demonstrated a lack of respect for consent. It additionally needs to be seen as an act of white supremacy when it comes from a man who has consistently spouted racist rhetoric.

Which is why I was so disappointed to see so many in the sex-positive community jumping to speak up for the pissplayers. I mean, yes, when you’re into kinky sex and the media is saying how disgusting that is, I get that there’s a desire to educate and defend yourselves. But it rings hollow when the person you’re defending is someone who doesn’t understand risk-aware consensual kink, when they have been accused multiple times of sexual assault, when they have threatened women into silence.

Trump is not into consensual watersports. There is no indication, even, that he interacted with pee in any way, or found any sexual enjoyment from the interaction. This isn’t some “your kink is OK” thing, from my reading of it — it’s not about sex. He didn’t hire sex workers to pee on him or each other; he hired them to pee on a bed the Obamas slept on as a method of defiling it. This was an act of racism and toxic masculinity, of marking territory, of demanding ownership and feeling entitled. We must call it out for what it is, or we risk fascism just becoming another hanky color.

Kitty Stryker is a writer, activist, and authority on developing a consent culture in alternative communities as well as an active member of the genderqueer feminist art collective, the NorCal Degenderettes. She was the founder of ConsentCulture.com, a website that ran for 4 years as a hub for LGBT/kinky/poly folks looking for a sex critical approach to relationships. Now working on "Ask: Building Consent Culture", an anthology through Thorntree Press coming out in 2017, Kitty tours internationally speaking at universities and conferences about feminism, sex work, body positivity, queer politics, and more. She lives in Oakland, California with her wife, boyfriend, and two cats, Foucault and Nietzsche. For media inquiries and bookings, email miss.kitty.stryker@gmail.com.